Factotum has few spell slots, but only one of them can be of top level. Basically, the rest are one level lower, or 6th level slots.
And nobody's been complaining that their casting is overpowered. So... Why keep level-specific spell slots? It makes little fluff sense, even for wizards and none at all for sorcerers.
If one'd eliminate the level-specific slots, and all slots were of the highest possible level, one could get away from spells which cap based on the level. There'd also be no need for greater/lesser variants.
Because a high-level wizard should be using awesome high-level magic to defeat his incredibly-powerful foes. He shouldn't be using burning hands.
Because our spells go to 11.
Pathfinder Adventure, Rulebook Subscriber
Because we expect wizards to have a huge amount of spells available which brings everyone along for the ride.
I would totally support a Book of Nine Swords approach in which you have a set number of slots to put spells in, and as you level you replace your spells instead of getting more slots.
Sean K Reynolds wrote: Because a high-level wizard should be using awesome high-level magic to defeat his incredibly-powerful foes. He shouldn't be using burning hands. Why not?
I AM KARZOUG, RUNELORD OF GREED. LET ME BLAST YOU WITH A SPELL THAT ANY 1ST-LEVEL WIZARD CAN CAST: THE DREADED BURNING HANDS!!!!! IMPRESSIVE, YES!
That's why.
Also, if 1st-level spells continue to scale, then casters are even more powerful... they don't even have to use their best spells to outshine the fighter.
Pathfinder Adventure, Rulebook Subscriber
Actually, if a 9th level Burning Hands was a 90ft cone of Reflex vs. incineration, that would be impressive.
Pathfinder Adventure, Adventure Path, Lost Omens Subscriber
I was going to suggest a maximized empowered widened burning hands, but it turns out that a 9th level slot for 28 damage isn't actually that exciting, even with a 30ft cone. (And by a strict reading of the rules it still has a 1st level spell's DC? Ouch.)
Sean K Reynolds wrote: I AM KARZOUG, RUNELORD OF GREED. LET ME BLAST YOU WITH A SPELL THAT ANY 1ST-LEVEL WIZARD CAN CAST: THE DREADED BURNING HANDS!!!!! IMPRESSIVE, YES!
That's why.
Also, if 1st-level spells continue to scale, then casters are even more powerful... they don't even have to use their best spells to outshine the fighter.
I totally disagree. I say a 20th level master wizard should be able to cast basic spells with more force and skill than anyone less powerful than him. That's real mastery; doing something very simple, but with exquisite skill.
This also leads to the endless padding of spell lists; there is no reason to have twenty different entries for what is essentially the same "shoot fire/lightning/miscellaneous energy, cause dXX times level in damage" spells. In addition to the redundancy, it's just plain boring. You could easily accomplish the same effect by having one fire spell, one electricity spell etc with feats that allow you to expand your range and area of effect without killing so many poor trees in the process, and making players learn 30 different names for "wave hands, cause damage." Giving them fancier names is just needless window dressing.
That way, when a wizard learns a new spell, it could actually be, well, a new spell. I really like the way that PFRPG has brought additional consistency to spells and powers like summon monster, giving the spells a sensible structured progression, I just wish they'd gone a step further and done that with some of the combat spells too.
Pathfinder Adventure, Rulebook Subscriber
But how would game designers fill out their word count and earn their pay that way? :)
Magathus wrote:
I totally disagree. I say a 20th level master wizard should be able to cast basic spells with more force and skill than anyone less powerful than him. That's real mastery; doing something very simple, but with exquisite skill.
Isn't that what happens with virtually all spells on one or more levels? A 20th level wizard's burning hands spell is more powerful than a 5th level wizard's (if only in caster level and Ref save DC) which in turn is more powerful than a 1st level wizard's.
Senevri wrote: So... Why keep level-specific spell slots? It makes little fluff sense, even for wizards and none at all for sorcerers. Requesting a citation of the fluff you're referring to.
Magathus wrote: I totally disagree. I say a 20th level master wizard should be able to cast basic spells with more force and skill than anyone less powerful than him. That's real mastery; doing something very simple, but with exquisite skill. In the same way that a 20th level master fighter should be able to hit someone with a nonmagical common longsword with more force and skill than anyone less powerful than him: because he has feats like Power Attack, Weapon Focus, and Weapon Specialization (the wizard's counterpart is Spell Focus, Greater Spell Focus, the evocation school's intense spells ability, and so on). He's still using the cheap tool. If he used a better tool, he'd do more damage.
If every spell a caster has becomes incredibly powerful, then caster power increases very fast. If a burning hands can do 1d4 per level caps-at-20th, why bother learning a higher-level spell that does 1d6 per level caps-at-20th?
Magathus wrote: This also leads to the endless padding of spell lists; there is no reason to have twenty different entries for what is essentially the same "shoot fire/lightning/miscellaneous energy, cause dXX times level in damage" spells. In addition to the redundancy, it's just plain boring. You could easily accomplish the same effect by having one fire spell, one electricity spell etc Yes, because "I cast the fire spell" isn't boring at all. :)
Magathus wrote: with feats that allow you to expand your range and area of effect without killing so many poor trees in the process, and making players learn 30 different names for "wave hands, cause damage." Giving them fancier names is just needless window dressing. And here I thought knowing all the ins and outs of the game was a fun thing. :)
Anyway, sounds like you'd like the new magic system Jason is working on for Ultimate Magic. :)
Something you can do to change the fact of DCs to reflect a more difficult save between a lvl 5 caster and a lvl 10 caster would be to alter the way the DC is attained. Based on Pathfinder the DC of a spell is:
"The Difficulty Class for a saving throw against a wizard's spell is 10 + the spell level + the wizard's Intelligence modifier."
If you change it to read like this:
"The Difficulty Class for a saving throw against a wizard's spell is 10 + 1/2 caster level + the wizard's Intelligence modifier."
The there would be a difference to show that a higher lvl caster can cast the same spell as a lower lvl caster, but with more effectiveness.
Two mages with the same Int/Cma bonus(+3) under the normal rules would have a DC of 14 as follows 10 + 1(spell lvl) +3 (stat mod)
If you change the lvl of spell for 1/2 caster lvl, it would look like this:
Mage lvl 6 casts Burning hands with a DC 16
Mage lvl 12 cast burning hands with a DC 19
This way it does not change the damage a spell can deal, but shows that a higher lvl mage casts a more difficult to evade spell.
Hope that made some sense to you :-)
Hector
mage4fun wrote: Something you can do to change the fact of DCs to reflect a more difficult save between a lvl 5 caster and a lvl 10 caster would be to alter the way the DC is attained. Based on Pathfinder the DC of a spell is:
"The Difficulty Class for a saving throw against a wizard's spell is 10 + the spell level + the wizard's Intelligence modifier."
If you change it to read like this:
"The Difficulty Class for a saving throw against a wizard's spell is 10 + 1/2 caster level + the wizard's Intelligence modifier."
The there would be a difference to show that a higher lvl caster can cast the same spell as a lower lvl caster, but with more effectiveness.
Two mages with the same Int/Cma bonus(+3) under the normal rules would have a DC of 14 as follows 10 + 1(spell lvl) +3 (stat mod)
If you change the lvl of spell for 1/2 caster lvl, it would look like this:
Mage lvl 6 casts Burning hands with a DC 16
Mage lvl 12 cast burning hands with a DC 19
This way it does not change the damage a spell can deal, but shows that a higher lvl mage casts a more difficult to evade spell.
Hope that made some sense to you :-)
Hector
Shouldn't a 6th level spell be harder to save against than a 3rd level spell?
The problem is spells scale in two progressions that are related to each other - spell level and caster level. Highest spell level increases roughly every 2 caster levels for primary casters.
I worked on a system that took both into account back during the core rules playtest, but I don't know if I still have my numbers and I don't recall if I actually came up with something workable. I think I gave it up as a lost cause due to how far the range of saves got spread out.
anthony Valente wrote: Senevri wrote: So... Why keep level-specific spell slots? It makes little fluff sense, even for wizards and none at all for sorcerers. Requesting a citation of the fluff you're referring to. Okay, the basic vancian fluff is that wizards create a space in their head where the spells go to live in, until they're cast.
Now, with the slot system, a wizard creates a tiny place, another tiny place, and suddenly, a place that's twice as large. (although one could see it as one of the tiny places stretching and the wizard gaining another tiny place, which does make a bit more fluff-sense).
A sorcerer's spells are innate - them having specific spells is already a bit... odd, (unless all researched spells enter/come from some sort of a platonic idea space which the sorcerers hook up to.) but the fact they have a per-level limited number of slots is rather odd - although moderated by the fact that they can use higher level slots to cast lower level spells ANYway... but, regardless,
In the odd chance that a sorcerer has spent most of their lower-level spell slots, they.... have to spend the power equal to 'time stop' to cast 'grease'. I'm sorry, what?
thus, I feel it's just more intuitive if the power scales automatically. I mean, as-is, no matter how hard you try, after 9th level or so, your magic missile - or burning hands, isn't going to get any better.
Of course, to implement a slot system like this, you'd have to limit the number of slots a caster gets. On a 1:2 ratio, a Sorcerer gets about ~10 slots from their progression, which isn't a lot, admittedly. (although a 9th-level slot is priced at 256 1st-level slots. )Going by the spell point translation cost, it'd be quite a bit more, around 30 or so, I think. ( haven't done the math on that one. )
Regarding Burning Hands: If a 20th-level wizard has a 20-die burning hands, a 20-die fireball won't see use?
The thing is... There's a bunch of 'lesser' and 'greater' versions of various spells floating around, the justification being that you can't have unlimited power from a low-level spell, and that higher-level spells should be more awesome. But, if you didn't have slots of a specific level you cast from, you could have the spells freely scale, as you'd always be casting the highest level of spells you could potentially cast.
I mean, sure, it's a great way to pad up the spellbook, to have an elemental attack spell, for each element, for each level, each having a bit better maximum damage, few more feet of range or radius... :P You can already print 45 spells by doing that. Instead of one which scales.
There IS an economy issue, in that a wizard or sorcerer should be able to cast hundreds of little spells per day, although in practice, most spellcasters I've seen, rarely go above, oh, ten-twenty per day.
Of course, speaking of game styles and 15-minute wizard days, to bring in the word processor design analogy, if you say 'people only use 20% of their class features' , you'd better be really sure everyone's using the SAME 20% before you go a-pruning.
Sean K Reynolds wrote:
Anyway, sounds like you'd like the new magic system Jason is working on for Ultimate Magic. :)
Oh REALLY. You TEASE! ^_^
Sean K Reynolds wrote:
In the same way that a 20th level master fighter should be able to hit someone with a nonmagical common longsword with more force and skill than anyone less powerful than him: because he has feats like Power Attack, Weapon Focus, and Weapon Specialization (the wizard's counterpart is Spell Focus, Greater Spell Focus, the evocation school's intense spells ability, and so on). He's still using the cheap tool. If he used a better tool, he'd do more damage.
Heh. Well put. Indeed, unfortunately fighters don't get their tools automatically, and they may not be have decision-power to pick which tools they get.
I really should try a game where, if loot is random, so are the spells primary casters gain... :P
Quote: If every spell a caster has becomes incredibly powerful, then caster power increases very fast. If a burning hands can do 1d4 per level caps-at-20th, why bother learning a higher-level spell that does 1d6 per level caps-at-20th? Because it does _something else_. Make first-level spells basic and simple, and make the higher-level ones more advanced. Add status effects, terrain changes, and so forth. Sure, you'll end up with 'why use a lower level spell, then?' but that's the situation right now... and the earlier spell would still have SOME worth, especially for players who don't like complexity all that much.
Quote: Yes, because "I cast the fire spell" isn't boring at all. :) Touché.
Quote: And here I thought knowing all the ins and outs of the game was a fun thing. :) Oh, it is, up to a point. Having a zillion spells doing very nearly the same thing... not necessarily the key.
Admittedly, there'd be some emergent traits - you'd probably need some sort of a reserve mechanic (as 10 - or even 30 - spell slots in and as themselves aren't very much), and perhaps a design/on-the-spot modification mechanic. Hm. (scribblescribble)
Quote: Anyway, sounds like you'd like the new magic system Jason is working on for Ultimate Magic. :) Ooh gimme! :D
One of the reasons I didn't go for 4e once I finally got to look at it was the fact that everything runs on the same system. The reason I like 3.x is that it works by bolting an add-on to the basic chassis.
Magathus wrote: Sean K Reynolds wrote: I AM KARZOUG, RUNELORD OF GREED. LET ME BLAST YOU WITH A SPELL THAT ANY 1ST-LEVEL WIZARD CAN CAST: THE DREADED BURNING HANDS!!!!! IMPRESSIVE, YES!
That's why.
Also, if 1st-level spells continue to scale, then casters are even more powerful... they don't even have to use their best spells to outshine the fighter.
I totally disagree. I say a 20th level master wizard should be able to cast basic spells with more force and skill than anyone less powerful than him. That's real mastery; doing something very simple, but with exquisite skill.
This also leads to the endless padding of spell lists; there is no reason to have twenty different entries for what is essentially the same "shoot fire/lightning/miscellaneous energy, cause dXX times level in damage" spells. In addition to the redundancy, it's just plain boring. You could easily accomplish the same effect by having one fire spell, one electricity spell etc with feats that allow you to expand your range and area of effect without killing so many poor trees in the process, and making players learn 30 different names for "wave hands, cause damage." Giving them fancier names is just needless window dressing.
That way, when a wizard learns a new spell, it could actually be, well, a new spell. I really like the way that PFRPG has brought additional consistency to spells and powers like summon monster, giving the spells a sensible structured progression, I just wish they'd gone a step further and done that with some of the combat spells too. you need to play old school dungeons and dragons or 1st edition ad&d. Many of their damage spells did that. I still play both games and pathfinder, they all have their charm.
Senevri wrote: Factotum has few spell slots, but only one of them can be of top level. Basically, the rest are one level lower, or 6th level slots.
And nobody's been complaining that their casting is overpowered. So... Why keep level-specific spell slots? It makes little fluff sense, even for wizards and none at all for sorcerers.
If one'd eliminate the level-specific slots, and all slots were of the highest possible level, one could get away from spells which cap based on the level. There'd also be no need for greater/lesser variants.
You know, many people says that psionics are overpowered because they can use all their power to cast high level spells only. Do something BARELY similar with Wizards and they'll prolly try to kill you.
Sean K Reynolds wrote:
In the same way that a 20th level master fighter should be able to hit someone with a nonmagical common longsword with more force and skill than anyone less powerful than him: because he has feats like Power Attack, Weapon Focus, and Weapon Specialization (the wizard's counterpart is Spell Focus, Greater Spell Focus, the evocation school's intense spells ability, and so on). He's still using the cheap tool. If he used a better tool, he'd do more damage.
I'm mostly with you here, I just think the importance of the tool shouldn't be overrated either. I prefer systems that emphasize skills more than weapons upgrades, and I utterly despise the fantasy trope of constantly needing to upgrade to bigger and flashier swords or spells to be effective.
Sean K Reynolds wrote:
If every spell a caster has becomes incredibly powerful, then caster power increases very fast. If a burning hands can do 1d4 per level caps-at-20th, why bother learning a higher-level spell that does 1d6 per level caps-at-20th?
This is true, but I think it's a good thing to have a few less spells; we're not really losing anything except needless differentiation between things which are practically the same.
Sean K Reynolds wrote:
Yes, because "I cast the fire spell" isn't boring at all. :)
I don't see much difference between a player saying "I shoot him" and a player saying "I shoot him with my pearl-handled custom .357 magnum loaded with winchester hollow points and mounted with a laser sight."
The second description is merely distracting you from the action (one person shooting at another) by excessive detail about the weapon which isn't really that significant to the story...unless we're talking about one of those systems that makes you calculate the slight difference in damage caused by every little variable in weapon and ammunition type...and that's not my idea of good game rules.
Sean K Reynolds wrote:
And here I thought knowing all the ins and outs of the game was a fun thing. :)
I find playing games to be fun; memorizing rules for long lists of powers, not so much.
Sean K Reynolds wrote:
Anyway, sounds like you'd like the new magic system Jason is working on for Ultimate Magic. :)
I very much look forward to seeing what he comes up with!
Freesword wrote: mage4fun wrote:
This way it does not change the damage a spell can deal, but shows that a higher lvl mage casts a more difficult to evade spell.
Hope that made some sense to you :-)
Hector
Shouldn't a 6th level spell be harder to save against than a 3rd level spell?
The problem is spells scale in two progressions that are related to each other - spell level and caster level. Highest spell level increases roughly every 2 caster levels for primary casters.
I worked on a system that took both into account back during the core rules playtest, but I don't know if I still have my numbers and I don't recall if I actually came up with something workable. I think I gave it up as a lost cause due to how far the range of saves got spread out.
Yes a lvl 6 would be harder. Lets take a look at when you get a lvl 6 spell and a lvl 3 spell and using the fact that the spell caster in question has a +3 stat modifier:
Spell caster has to be lvl 5 minimum to cast a lvl 3 spell, lets say he is 6th lvl, he can't yet cast lvl 6 spells so his Dc for that 3rd lvl spell would be DC 16 (10 +1/2 caster lvl +3 stat ability).
Now for the 6th lvl spell he would have to be a minimum of 11th lvl, lets say he is lvl 12, the DC for his 6th lvl spell would be DC 19 (10 + 1/2 caster lvl + 3 stat ability)
Another way to do this may so the DC scales up with the lvl may be to eliminate the stat modifier and add the spell level and make the DC look like this: DC = to 10 +1/2 spellcaster level +spell level). I know some may say that by eliminating the stat mod you are taking away from it, but by placing 1/2 caster lvl you are taking into account the spell casters experiance instead.
here is an example:
5 + A = 10
Most anyone can do this, 3rd grader, high-schooler, or graduate student. This is rather easy and the lvl of education doesn't really factor in. Now if I ask this:
2A(Asquared x 5) what is the answer and explain it, the higher your education, the more elaborate your answer can be as you have studied/learned more and you may express your self more clearly. i know the analogy may be a bit off, but it is difficult to put into words what I am think on how to explain it.
Sorry if it caused more confusion then help.
Hector
TriOmegaZero wrote: But how would game designers fill out their word count and earn their pay that way? :) Summon Monster and Summon Natures Ally are 2 very good examples of spells that should have scaled. Not saying you shouldn't have to memorize them into slots, just that if the spell scaled properly you could have still done that and saved 2 pages in the Core Rulebook for something more worthwhile. Extreme spell redundancy is not necessarily a good "feature".
Also, if say a Magic Missile spell actually scaled all the way to 20th lv, I'd consider it pretty useful (well as useful as a MM can be) instead of a wasted spell slot after a few levels. It's not entirely unreasonable to want to be able to use early spells and lower lv slots later in your career.
mage4fun wrote:
Yes a lvl 6 would be harder. Lets take a look at when you get a lvl 6 spell and a lvl 3 spell and using the fact that the spell caster in question has a +3 stat modifier:
Spell caster has to be lvl 5 minimum to cast a lvl 3 spell, lets say he is 6th lvl, he can't yet cast lvl 6 spells so his Dc for that 3rd lvl spell would be DC 16 (10 +1/2 caster lvl +3 stat ability).
Now for the 6th lvl spell he would have to be a minimum of 11th lvl, lets say he is lvl 12, the DC for his 6th lvl spell would be DC 19 (10 + 1/2 caster lvl + 3 stat ability)
Right, and at 12th level his DC for that 3rd level spell would also be 19. The exact same DC as his 6th level spell.
mage4fun wrote:
Another way to do this may so the DC scales up with the lvl may be to eliminate the stat modifier and add the spell level and make the DC look like this: DC = to 10 +1/2 spellcaster level +spell level). I know some may say that by eliminating the stat mod you are taking away from it, but by placing 1/2 caster lvl you are taking into account the spell casters experiance instead.
So a caster with a 16 casting stat and a caster with a 22 casting stat have the same DC if they are the same level and cast the same spell. In addition casters would have little incentive to ever bother raising their casting stat above 19 to meet the prerequisite to cast their highest spell level and still giving them a +4 to concentration checks.
Now let's look at a 20th level caster casting a 9th level spell.
10 +1/2 spellcaster level +spell level = 10 + 10 + 9 = 29
Good Base Save is 12, Poor Base Save is 6, and lets say +2 stat and Cloak of Resistance +5
Good Save - 12 + 2 + 5 = 19 - Needs a 10 or better
Poor Save - 6 + 2 + 5 = 13 - Needs a 16 or better
I'll grant you that removing the casting stat from the DC equation does seem to keep saves on the random number generator (d20). I hadn't tried that. But raising casting stat has been the best way to raise DCs. Without it DCs become pretty much fixed.
Getting back to the original topic, I've actually been thinking about getting rid of spell levels. The concept being you get your spell casting stat modifier (one time only) + 1/level spell slots per day and instead of spell levels, spells have minimum stat and caster level prerequisites. Saves would change to 10 + 1/2 caster level + casting stat modifier. Total spells per day would be fewer, but a caster could cast more of their most powerful spells (cue complaints about novaing and the 15 minute work day). The biggest problems are with spells that grant, mimic, or counter other spells based on level, concentration checks, and metamagic feats. Spells with a progression (like summon monster or cure x wounds) would auto unlock then new limit when the caster level prerequisites are met.
Oh, and prestige class prerequisites would change to caster level or ability to cast specific spells instead of casting a certain spell level.
For the metamagic issue, I'm thinking each level of increase instead be 1d8 non-lethal damage.
It may actually be doable while keeping nearly the entire spell section intact (one or two spells may have to be removed possibly). I'm sure there are a few other points that reference spell level that I missed.
Jarl wrote: TriOmegaZero wrote: But how would game designers fill out their word count and earn their pay that way? :) Summon Monster and Summon Natures Ally are 2 very good examples of spells that should have scaled. Not saying you shouldn't have to memorize them into slots, just that if the spell scaled properly you could have still done that and saved 2 pages in the Core Rulebook for something more worthwhile. Extreme spell redundancy is not necessarily a good "feature".
Also, if say a Magic Missile spell actually scaled all the way to 20th lv, I'd consider it pretty useful (well as useful as a MM can be) instead of a wasted spell slot after a few levels. It's not entirely unreasonable to want to be able to use early spells and lower lv slots later in your career. The summon spells do kind of scale in that you can use higher level summoning spells to summon more of them.
I'm still going to say that magic missile is amazing for a first level spell. It never fails you, and even when your Int is drained down to 11, it's still there...
Plus when you have a lot of low level casters using it the spell gets a lot scarier.
Pathfinder Adventure, Rulebook Subscriber
Madcap Storm King wrote:
The summon spells do kind of scale in that you can use higher level summoning spells to summon more of them. What we meant by scaling was 'do not waste page count reprinting the heading, school, area, and alignment rules nine times' instead of consolidating it into one entry.
OP, I think you are making the understandable mistake of expecting skill-based magic in a world of formulaic magic. This is a very common problem with Pathfinder magic, because the metaphysical "fluff" is entirely absent from the rulebook. To that end, here is the "fluff" I think you're hoping for:
There is a limit to the power of a first level spell because a first level spell is fundamentally different from a 5th level spell. It is NOT a skill that you can improve, but rather a specific formula that requires a dweomer of a certain type.
Remember that spells are like objects of a sort, discrete entities that casters can construct (because they are initiated) or anyone can trigger through force of persona (like with UMD). Spells exist as discrete entities before a given caster learns them, and they have properties all their own. It even takes a special kind of separate initiation (metamagic) to be able to alter spells outside their specific parameters.
This isn't weird or wrong, it just isn't skill-based, which leads many people to have issues with it. If you abandon the skill-based paradigm and celebrate that spells work differently from skills according to an elaborate and arcane methodology all their own, you'll may come to find that is quite compelling in its own right.
@Evil Lincoln: Okay, fair enough - spells as discrete entities do make in-setting sense, when put that way.
And I have been on a skill-based casting kick at the time of typing the OP.
Not sure it still explains having per-level spell slots, but there are _some_ ways to explain that, fluff-wise, too. ( basically, your 'oldest' slots become highest slots and you gain 'new' lower level slots, instead of gaining highest-level slots. )
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